Have you, or someone you care for experienced difficulties because of poor social care provision?This might include difficulty accessing care, being admitted to hospital because care was not available, having to stay in hospital longer than necessary, or having problems with the way care is delivered.We are asking people to share their stories – anonymously – using this short surveyhttps://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/2VGPV8W

What have Defend supporters been doing?The Hanover Neighbourhood Defend the NHS Group put on a great NHS at 70: Love it and Keep It event at the beginning of April. These events are continuing, so get in touch if your group would like to help out: NHS supporters, workers and families will be able to add stories and drawings to a very long scroll. We want to raise awareness of the situation in the NHS ahead of the 70th Anniversary in July

​Trainee GP faces deportationA doctor who has lived in the UK for a decade faces deportation just five months before completing his GP training. He was 18 days late in applying for Indefinite Leave to Remain. The BMA said the decision to press for his deportation because of a delay in his visa process 'beggars belief' He has created an online petition that you can support here.

Ghost Walk in The Lanes: Fundraiser and Fun for Sussex Defend NHSBig thanks to Rob Marks and to everyone who took part. We raised £210.59 https://ghostwalkbrighton.co.uk

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Residents' fears over potential closure of GP Surgery in Rottingdean​A petition to save a doctors' surgery which is a lifeline for the local community was handed to NHS bosses on 27th March - B&H Independent - and - Argus8 surgeries have closed in B&H - people are having to travel further to see a GP, and this can mean a difficult journey by public transport - we need to save our local surgeries. Find out more about Meadow Parade and sign the petition.

Support Albert Thompson's right to NHS treatment. Please sign this petition and share widely. ​Albert Thompson came to the UK from Jamaica as a teenager and has lived here for 44 years, working and paying taxes. Despite Commonwealth Citizens having rights, despite Albert having human rights, despite paying taxes for four decades, he has been refused treatment for his prostate cancer because he cannot prove he's 'legally entitled to live in the UK'. Sussex Defend the NHS believe this is an utter travesty of NHS principles and many thousands agree. This is all part of the 'hostile environment' that Theresa may wants to create. Not in our name.

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Last month over 100 people came to see our showing of the brilliant exhibition, Private Finance Initiative: How come we’re still paying for this? . It’s clear that PFI, like outsourcing and other forms of privatisation, is designed to allow private companies to make extravagant profits from public services. The public meeting agreed we should challenge new similar private infrastructure contracts and a future government must end the current schemes and bring them under full public control.” On Tuesday 27th March a public meeting heard from Youssef El-Ginghy, an ‘inspirational NHS campaigner’, Sally Hunt, General Secretary of the lecturers’ union UCU, and Helen Mercer, of People vs PFI, Speeches were followed by a very lively debate which ranged from PFI to financialisation and modern monetary theory to the current lecturers’ strike.http://peoplevspfi.org.uk/2018/03/31/brighton-hosts-the-exhibition/​

Brighton and Hove Council's response to GPs concerns about access to social careCouncil webcast: Starts at 0.15.18https://brighton-hove.public-i.tv/core/portal/webcast_interactive/329513Points to note:- There will be a full report on the Social Care budget, how the service operates, performance indicators etc. at HWB in June.- In 2016/17 700 fewer requests being made for social care services even though the number of elderly and frail people is rising. What happens to these people who are no longer eligible for care?- More government funding for social care is needed.- Brighton and Hove Council provides social care with a triage system, urgent cases can receive help within 24 hours, but those assessed as non-urgent can wait up to 13 days. GPs felt 13 days was too long to wait when someone might be at risk.- Community care, funded by the NHS, provided by Sussex Community Foundation Trust, is for patients who need health care. David Supple, CCG Chair, said GPs finding it difficult to access social care for patients, or unsure whether the patient needed social care of NHS care should contact CCG and he would deal with their problem.

Councillors warned new Accountable Care Organisations will herald the end of the NHS as we know it.

Councillors are to be asked to rethink their agreement to setting up a new way of organising health and social care in Brighton and Hove. The question, to the Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee, held in public on February 28th at 4pm, Hove Town Hall, quotes Professor Stephen Hawking who says, “ACOs are an attack on the fundamental principles of the NHS.” Full Press Release here

​​​JR4NHS Judicial ReviewThe Crowd Justice campaign taking the Government to court to stop the introduction of Accountable Care Organisations (ACO's), have reached their financial target. This is the legal battle supported by Stephen Hawking.

They're selling off Our NHS! Next up for sale is the Brighton General Hospital on Elm Grove.Please complete this survey - ends on 25th March... Tell them NOhttps://www.sussexcommunity.nhs.uk/about-us/brighton-general-community-health-hub.htmSussex Community Foundation Trust has launched a public survey for patients, residents and staff as they want to redevelop the Brighton General Hospital site. Sussex Defend the NHS urges all local residents (not just in the 1 mile radius it asks for) to respond to this – and speak with your MP and councillors too. While we agree that many of the old buildings are run down, we do not agree with the selling off of public property in order to build new facilities. It is unlikely the new school will be built there as the council have withdrawn their support, but it is very likely that the main ‘workhouse’ listed building will be sold to property developers.No to fire-sale of NHS sites - find out more

Brighton A&E consultant Rob Galloway's moving plea for this real story to be told.​

The future of your NHS is being decidedYour local NHS has been asked to make some big decisions about the healthcare that will be available to us in future and how it will be organised. Please take 5 minutes to complete this survey https://healthcheck.nhsfunding.info/survey/09D

Stop the STPswebsitecampaign informationto stop Sustainability & TransformationPlanshttp://www.stopthestps.org.uk/​What is happening with our Sustainability and Transformation plan (STP)? Is it becoming an ACO?

Contact your MP or local councillor. There is a template on our website and the brilliant NHS Support Federation has easy to follow links on their STP page.Please sign our STP petition if you haven't already.

​The NHS Reinstatement Bill campaign group are listing MP's who support the bill, and asking others to come forward. Two of our local MP's, Peter Kyle and Simon Kirby, currently do not support it: come on constituents, book those surgery meetings!

​Judicial Review to Save NHSPlease donate: http://bit.ly/999JudicialReview.999 Call for the NHS are crowdfunding a legal challenge to NHS England's "transforming" of the NHS into a 2-tier USA-style system, being carried out behind the blue logo If we don’t stop them the NHS will disappear very shortly, and with it the fabric of (what's left of) our society.

The NHS A Visual Essay NHS A Visual Essayfrom juniordoctorblog.com, explains how the Tories have underfunded the NHS so that it is now in crisis. Please share it far and wide - we can't let them win.

TORIES GUILTY OF NHS PRIVATISATION: THE EVIDENCE IS HERE -All the ideas in the FYFV and the STPs come directly from reports produced by the World Economic Forum which were discussed at Davos in 2012.

Simon Stevens chaired the key committee that developed the reports – which were both co-authored by McKinsey.

Until now we have always had to make inferences about the connections between key actors and political parties in the development of NHS privatisation. Now for the first time we have clear objective evidence of who is culpable and how.

​Some excellent articles ...NEW RELEASE: Profs. Martin McKee and Danny Dorling and colleagues ask "Why did so many more older people die in England and Wales in 2015?".https://chpi.org.uk/blog/why-did-so-many-more-older-people-die-in-england-and-wales-in-2015/ Based on their latest research in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, they explain how their investigation into rises in mortality rates in 2015 suggests the disturbing conclusion that some people may already be dying from the underfunding of health and social services. Find out more here.

In a similar vein, Prof. Chris Newdick writes about the Problems of Legal Status and Accountability with STPs teams - the envisaged interagency groupings who will implement the meat of the STPs. Newdick explains the pitfalls of the fudges that come with promising to “do more, with less” - just when we need to be clearer than ever about rights and duties in the NHS. He concludes that, "We need a new National Health Service Act to stabilise the NHS".https://chpi.org.uk/blog/stp-teams-problems-of-legal-status-and-accountability/These reports resonate with concerns from others across the health world (see below). Have a look at them and Tweet, Facebook or e-mail your friends and colleagues about them now to help spread the reach of our work.

​Donate to Sussex Defend the NHS. ​We are fighting against the odds to Save Our NHS. Your donation will help us arrange public meetings, events and dramas, produce leaflets, and campaign against the underhand way the government is privatising the NHS.​.PLEASE DONATE whatever amount you can by transferring it by BACS to Sussex Defend The NHSAccount No- 65681846Sort Code 08-92-99 ​Thanks, you could help save the NHS ​

​Sussex Defend the NHS Mission Statement

Sussex Defend the NHS is a network of nearly 3000 local campaigners, health workers, and trade-union activists. Our organisation has no affiliation to any political party.

We are campaigning to save our National Health Service, which for nearly 70 years has provided a cost effective, universal health service, free at the point of need to all people irrespective of their background, circumstance or ability to pay.

Years of cuts, piecemeal privatisation and irresponsible re-organisation mean we are rapidly heading for a rationed service, run for profit by big companies, US-style. Please join the fight to re-instate our NHS for the benefit of the patients and the staff who care for them.

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